Family Affairs and other matters

LAST DAY OF THE HOLIDAYS

I am trying very hard to enjoy having my children around for ONE LAST DAY. Although we are having a boring sorty out day. It is all change tomorrow when we have to get up super early for school tomorrow and get out in a hurry with all the relevant kit. That is not good. But then again, I am quite looking forward to normality resuming somewhat. Today has been a mad flurry of homework activity, interspersed with my daughter gagging in the garden whilst having to clean out a flower pot that her friend vomited in the night before, several vain attempts to remove my son’s ear piercing which seems well and truly stuck, dealing with a kitten with the shits, sorting out school uniform for tomorrow and consequently HUUUGE piles of washing and trying to deal with my ever increasing pile of admin and outstanding bills. I even added everyone’s birthday into my new diary (yes, I still have a paper diary) – when I was a proper married grown up many years ago I started a Birthday Book. I religiously wrote down everyone’s birthday and all their relevant offspring’s birthdays too. It was a little depressing going through it today. Lots of dead people. Lots of people I don’t see anymore owing to them being on my ex-husband’s side of the family. Lots of people I have never heard of (worryingly).

I have been cleaning and sorting mostly today. I haven’t got very far yet. Hardly made a dent. My house has been in utter chaos for two weeks. Many people staying, Xmas, my son’s birthday, New Year, a new kitten, TONS of teenagers hanging out all the time – all the usual stuff, but it has amounted to my house looking like this:-

The stairs:-

My washing pile (and that is just the white wash!!). Thinking I might just burn all the clothes and make them wear wash down plastic sheeting at all times instead:-

My teenage son’s room which I haven’t ventured into all holiday until today. HOW REVOLTING. Will have to spend the next two days searching for the floor and possibly several sleeping teenagers:-

Here is our recycling bag with added kitten (no longer allowed to leave the building – we’ve all become a little too attached and almost even agreed on a name):-

Here he is “helping” me take the Xmas tree down today. First time he’s dared climbed up that far and then he inevitably got stuck:-

Here he is exhausted from all that exertion. Is this the most laid back cat ever? Look at his little feet! (but not at what appears to be my Christmas stomach – I don’t remember stuffing a cushion under my jumper prior to the photo, but I might have:-

Peace and quiet tomorrow….

I bet I hate it.

TOP TIPS FOR PLANNING YOUR DISNEY HOLIDAY

If you are thinking about a Disney holiday then there is some information on a the following link: http://mydisneyworldplanner.co.uk/ There you will find some videos to help you plan your trip to Disney World, Where to Stay, Disney Dining Plan, What to do and Disney Cruise Line. There are lots of top tips for planning [...]

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DIVORCE AND CHRISTMAS

Normally I like to consider myself a feminist. Somebody who is quite capable of doing most things by myself. I try and engender that sentiment into my children at all times and presumably something must be going in. I live with my three children on my own for goodness sake. They know what goes on. I’m not massively good at the tidying up thing or the homework thing. If I had to spend too long doing their homework there wouldn’t be time for anything else. Oh, and I’m pretty crap at the cooking too. I recently discovered that my daughter had sent Builder Bloke a text some time ago saying “please come back, the food is shit!”.

In many ways, life really isn’t too bad without a man. There is no arguing – apart from directly with the children. There is mostly a lot of laughter. My children have had to grow up quickly in lots of ways. They are pretty mature on the whole and very good company. I am definitely closer to them because of my divorce – I guess that’s inevitable when there isn’t a partner you feel you should stand by during an issue with the children.

Anyway, Christmas turned me into a little bit of a sexist I hate to admit and it made me feel a little grumpy here and there. There was no division of girly/blokey labour to be had. It started with the refusing to go and chop myself down a big old tree, carry it home, hack it about and hurl it into a stand and then decorate it. This year I simply put my foot down and went for the black Emo tree (as my kids described it) which my children turned their nose up on every passing I’m afraid to say. My daughter has subsequently provided me with a list of people who have told her they don’t like it. BUT I DON’T CARE. It was easy and I can bring it out next year and have the same argument all over again.

Then the next issue was simply cooking the Christmas meal on my own with no one to carve the turkey or the ham or make the gravy or do the washing up. Or get pissed and fall asleep on the sofa. Or drive us to different venues to see friends later in the day. Or buy all the booze. Or talk to my mother after too many whiskeys. Or wrap all the presents or (most importantly) buy me a present. I had to do it all on my own.

I DON’T WANT TO DO IT ALL ON MY OWN.

Is your Christmas divided along male/female lines or am I being ridiculous here?

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NEW YEAR’S EVE & RESOLUTIONS

Another year gone. Shit. Where has the time gone? Why does it speed up the older we get? I’m not sure I want to do much reflecting on my year. I’m not sure there would be any point. Like most of us there were some good and bad things. For a start only one of us married our prince and most of us probably didn’t finish our novels, move jobs, homes, lives…..Why do we put ourselves through the agony of trying to change our lives knowing that only about 20% of us will stick to our resolutions?

So here we are again facing the end of another year and all that hope that comes with the start of the New Year. What will we achieve this year I wonder? What regrets will we have that things should be different? and if we do have regrets shouldn’t we somehow try to turn them into opportunities.

I don’t know what resolutions to choose this year. I fluctuate between wanting to save the world and wanting to save myself – which is fairly typical I suspect.

Last year my main resolution was:-

“Kindness in others troubles
Courage in your own”

Then in addition I had:-

Travel more
Eat less
Become a lesbian
Write a book
Move to Australia
Make more use of London
Visit my Grandmother more
Have a facelift
Hair extensions?
Get married.

The year before that I had written a list out that had been sabotaged by post it notes:-

So. I still want to travel more and drink, eat less, not sure the lesbian thing is a good idea, might drop that and maybe most of the others too….

Most of all, after spending a considerable amount of time with a friend of mine wondering whether world peace was more important than inner peace because how do you have one without the other and whether we should become Buddhists, we agreed on something else yesterday. That maybe Buddhism wasn’t for us after all (not because you are not allowed to drink or speak very much and there isn’t a centre near where we live) because perhaps after all we found that internal calm was a little bit dull…..

So this year, I think that my NY’s resolution will simply be to

“LIVE
LAUGH
LOVE”

As much as possible all the time (without hopefully having to resort to internet sites).

I think we should all aim to be as happy as possible and to laugh as much as possible and to have as much fun as you can. It’s not going to be easy, Europe is collapsing around our ears and the rest of the world think it’s time to put Europe in a map and hang it on the wall for posterity. We are all worried about lots of things and having a tough time – so the answer is to just try and enjoy life as much as we can – our partner (if you’re lucky enough to have one), our children (ditto) and our life in general. I’m going to try and stop looking at the negatives and look at all the positives instead. Personally, not being an optimist, but a realist, that isn’t always easy, but I’m going to avoid pessimism. I am going to surround myself with the people I love and hopefully a few who I haven’t met yet who boost and generate ones soul. Which is a good thing, because that means I can still carry on doing all those things that are going to kill me…..because life is just to short to worry about everything else.

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ONESIES/ONEPIECES FOR ADULTS

My daughter has found a good place to keep our Christmas kitten: Kids haven’t stopped wearing them all holiday and sorry to add the post again, but I keep getting the title wrong – yes they’re Onesies, but these ones are called OnePieces now. Here is the one my son chose http://onepiece.com/gb/shop/product/view:TR10001 – he looks [...]

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POST XMAS

Feeling a little worse for wear after several days of hardcore partying……lots of family and friends and a new baby and a new kitten and kids and mess and just all that lovely stuff that is what Christmas is all about. It’s gone all quiet again now. That is the strange thing about divorce and [...]

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BOXING DAY

SOOOO. How did you all get on? Was it a Merry/Messy Christmas? We had a great day with family and friends. Ate, drank, played Charades, drank more, ate more, forgot to watch the Queen’s speech and it was all good. We all wore our special Christmas clothes – my mother even had her special Christmas [...]

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